Highland Volunteers Help Turtles Make Tracks To Sea

A gray mist hung over the ocean as Jose Echeverria and his wife J.D. made their daily early morning walk down the beach in search of the evidence.

Hurrying down the steps of the boardwalk, Jose Echeverria spotted what he was looking for immediately.

Just above the tide line, with the waves lapping at them, were the tracks of last night`s visitor -- a huge loggerhead sea turtle.

``We`ve always been interested in things from the sea,`` Jose Echeverria said. ``We love the sea. Long as I can remember, I`ve lived by the sea. I walk the beach -- even in the rain. Rain I don`t mind, it`s the lightning. I come in if I see the lightning.``

Jose Echeverria is the leader of turtle watch volunteers from the town of Highland Beach. The volunteers search the beach each morning for turtle tracks, which to an untrained eye might be mistaken for the tire tracks of the truck that rakes the beach.

Unlike the tire tracks that criss-cross the beach, these tracks begin at the water and sometimes turn back to the ocean creating a fan pattern in the sand.

When the turtle turns back to the sea, the Echeverrias call it a ``false crawl.``

``Maybe she doesn`t like the feel of the sand. Or she comes to some obstruction,`` J.D. Echeverria said. ``Or maybe someone shined a light or she saw lightning.``

When the Echeverrias or one of the 10 volunteers finds a turtle trail that leads uninterrupted toward the dune, ending with an indentation and freshly churned sand, he pounds a stake at the end of the trail and ties a colored piece of plastic at the top. Orange plastic means the stake was placed there in May. Yellow is for June. White is for July.

Last year, on the approximately three miles of beachfront in Highland Beach, the turtle watch volunteers placed 367 stakes. So far this season, which runs from April to September, approximately 190 stakes dot the beach.

Anywhere from 45 to 60 days from the time the tracks are spotted, hundreds of tiny turtles will emerge around the stake at the first light of dawn. They will make a mad dash for the sea while birds swoop and dive overhead, gorging themselves on the babies, while ghost crabs, raccoons and other predators lurk nearby waiting for their chance.

Echeverria and his crew assist the babies by carrying them to the sea in buckets, rinsing them off, then placing them on the sand near the water. They allow the turtles to feel the texture and temperature of the sand.

Scientists believe that turtles remember the temperature and texture of the sand where they took their first steps and the females return to that location to lay their eggs, Echeverria said.

In populated areas, sometimes the babies head inland instead of toward the ocean.

Scientists theorize that baby turtles are attracted by light -- that is how they know which way the ocean is. In more remote areas, the sky over the sea is lighter at dawn than the sky over land.

``They use the lightness of the sky to orient themselves,`` said Steve Bass, a naturalist at the Gumbo Limbo Nature Center in Boca Raton. ``Usually the sky over the ocean is lighter, but now there is oftentimes more light over land. They become disoriented. Some of them get run over on A1A.``

From the approximately 100 eggs laid in each nest, perhaps one hatchling will successfully make its way to the sea and live to be an adult. Certain varieties of sea turtles take 30 years to reach maturity and may live to be 100 years old.

Once the baby turtle makes it to the water, it will remain in the depths of the sea, covering great distances around the world, until it is time to nest. The male never returns to land.

Under cover of night, the scaly-faced reptile, whose ancestors have inhabited the Earth for as long as 100 million years, pulls herself away from the edge of the ocean, swinging her head slowly from side to side to make sure the coast is clear.

Laboring with its 200- to 1,500-pound weight, the turtle drags herself up the beach using her muscular flippers.

Three species of turtles are common to Palm Beach County beaches. The loggerhead is the most common. The green turtle, considered an endangered species, nests on beaches in the area. Occasionally, the huge tracks of the leatherback will be seen.

Until she completes her march across the sand, any light or disturbance will send the turtle back to the water. Once the turtle has built her nest and begun laying eggs, humans may observe the process without scaring the creature.

Cities up and down the coast have organized turtle watches in which the public can learn about the habits of the sea turtles and carefully observe the females laying their eggs.

In Boca Raton, the city has a turtle specialist who canvasses the beach each morning identifying nests and placing a protective wire screen over them.

So far, approximately 280 nests have been found on the beaches in Boca Raton.

Immediately after they are laid, the leathery eggs are about the size of pingpong balls and are shiny, like just-peeled hard-boiled eggs.